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This YouTube Link is a great interview. No BS PRS tells it all, and IMO, the way to run a company with integrity and with a focus on quality and customer satisfaction. "Eight people examine a guitar before it goes out of their factory door!

I can never tell if Paul is being serious, funny, arrogant or otherwise sometimes. Either way, I hope they put out McCarty SE version both single and double cut. I prefer tunamatic bridges and stop tails. I just hope it has a 12" radius fingerboard and not the 10" like the US model has. They are sweet!!

Agreed that it's hard to read him as he comes off at times rather obnoxious and sarcastic (in a condescending way). Yet he will back up his cocky side remarks with a chuckle and "seriously..." like it's all in jest.

My preference, too, is a 12" radius although I even find Fender's 9.5" radius easy to adapt to. Super flat fretboards can get a bit fatiguing to my fretting hand after awhile however - probably because I'm using too much finger fretting pressure.

One of his most enlightening comments (for me) was in regards to studio vocal pitch correction. No wonder the commercially successful pop stars all sound the same, and artificial and shallow, these days. Why Does Modern Pop Music Sound So Terrible

Paul always seems to me like a guy who'd rather be making guitars than doing any kind of press or interviews. To me, it seems like he understands that since its his name on the gear that it's necessary to a certain amount of press and be in the spotlight for periods of time, but that it isn't something he'd do at all if he didn't have to. I think he'd rather be talking to artists, suppliers, luthiers, and his accountants than have a microphone in front of him - so when he's doing press he makes the best of it by including a few snarky comments or not-so-great jokes in there just to entertain himself.

He's certainly not a recluse and I like the idea that he'll play the gear in press materials periodically. When doing the more "official" PRS press materials, he always comes off as super passionate, extremely knowledgeable, serious, and grateful for his good fortune. I dig Paul a lot.

His guitars, on the other hand - and again this is just me - are hit and miss. The two PRS guitars I have I freaking love and wouldn't trade for anything in the world. I've played a ton of them and have found most of them to be not terribly easy to bond with, but that could be due to setup issues arising from the shops in which they're kept. The two PRS guitars I have are every bit as good as my two Suhrs, which are hands-down the best guitars I've ever owned.

Omsong wrote:Agreed that it's hard to read him as he comes off at times rather obnoxious and sarcastic (in a condescending way).

That is exactly what I get from him. I find him glib and superficial and quite off-putting frankly. I owned two PRSs. If I inquired for support, I was a number. I also found the guitars hit and miss. My first was an SC245 which was great and sounded killer. I followed that up with a SC58 (or whatever it was) and it just sucked. Both got sold. No lost love there.

I have seen/met him twice. The second time I got to spend a bit of time with him. I was trying to help him fix a small problem with some gear at a music store open house. I think he is one of those intelligent people that may be ever so lacking in social skills. I know I tried a small sarcastic joke and he did not recognize the sarcasm. Kinda Sheldon from big bang theory.

Definitely agree with that assessment. One of the biggest mind effs was watching him trying to keep up with someone like the great Greg Koch at NAMM recently.. Greg of course is spewing humor in 360* in a 3D circle, while playing brainbendingly impossible licks (that are also hysterically funny AND sinister).. and PRS is just lost. The more jokes you tell around him to loosen up the atmosphere, it seems (at times at least) to just make things even more awkward because it's tough for him to be loose and genuine. Just awkward comeback one after the other that demonstrates his mind doesn't live in that wild place anymore (not a crime), or just being so flummoxed he has to pretend Greg didn't say anything, just bloop right over it and stare desperately at the guitar in Greg's hands and latch onto some bullet point of construction, "And you see here our adjustable wraparound bridge."

He's definitely not an ultra serious, "dig my life" kind of entrepreneur.. he seems to like a good time and to yuk it up. He's just awkward like TT said.

And it's ancient history, but he rightfully stepped in at a time when Gibson in particular was at a low in terms of perceived quality, and tweezed a lot of Les Paul / SG players away from them and publicly put these PRS's in their hands with some great results.

I also credit him for (at least for what I've seen thus far, but I may have missed something) avoiding the whole "relic-ing" market.

Paul reminds me of a supervisor I once had who was intellectually extremely sharp. He could rip open a new complex software application and understand it's intricacies in very short order. I then witnessed him explaining some detail about it's functions to a novice user (including myself ) with obvious impatience at their inability to grasp it as quickly as he did. A perfectionist with a superiority complex, he often indirectly let us know that he could perform every task he assigned better than we could. (And he probably could have finished it faster, too).

I get the sense that Paul is a guy of superior intelligence who grows quickly impatient with those around him who don't grasp the scope and depth of a issue as quickly and clearly as he does, and tries to hide his contempt with sarcastic humor. I may be completely mis-reading him, but my experience says otherwise. I admire him for his successes in a very difficult and competitive industry, but can imagine that he runs a tight ship that sails his way, always.

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